
Book_^]lilIi3. 



/ 



AN 



OEATIOf^ 



THE LIFE AND SERVICES 



DELIVERED AT 



DANBURY, APRIL 27th, 1854, 



"When a Monument was erected to His Memory. 



BY 



HENRY CHAMPION DEMING. 



f artf0r!tr: 

PRESS OF CASE, TIFFANY AND COMPANY. 



M.DCCC.LIV. 



v\iqiJ3 



i^iroe UAkftcvn 



Xew Haven, May 8th, 1854. 
Hon. Henry C. Deming : 

Dear Sir and Brother: 
The M. W. Grand Lodge of Connecticut, at a special session held on the 
evening of the 27th of April last, appointed the undersigned a committee, 
to solicit a copy of the oration, delivered by you, upon the occasion of the 
completion of the Wooster Monument, for publication. 

The important services rendered by General Wooster in the great cause 
of American liberty, have never before been fully understood. The deep 
research exhibited by you in this matter ; the able and eloquent manner in 
which those services were presented in your address, and the desire that 
knowledge upon this subject may be widely disseminated, induce us to urge 
■ upon you a compliance with the vote of the Grand Lodge. 

We are fraternally yours, 

D. B. BOOTH, ) 

E. G. STOKER, \- Committee. 
CHAS. BALL, ) 



Hartford, May 14th, 1854. 
D. B. Booth, E. G. Storeu, and Chas. Ball: 
Gentlemen: 

I am in the receipt to-day of your letter, communicating the request of 
the Grand Lodge of the State, for a copy of my oration, on the life and 
services of Gen. David Wooster, for publication. I regret that the task, of 
investigating the claims of Wooster, upon the gratitude of his countrymen, 
had not been imposed upon me at an earlier day. His career was marked 
by none of those brilliant exploits, transmitted to us by the annalist and his- 
torian. Devotion to Liberty in the hour of her adversity — a magnanimous 
forgetfulness of self in the cause of his country— unfaltering patriotism and a 
self-sacrificing spirit, were Wooster's life, and the uniform, but undazzling 
illustration of these qualities, for more than thirty years, of severe and dis- 
heartening warfare, was his career. Such men live in the memories of their 
contemporaries, rather than on the page of history. But the contemporaries 
of Wooster were all dead when my investigations commenced. 

I have resorted to all the published memorials, and to every traditionary 
source, for information respecting him, and yet I feel sensibly, that my outline 
of his story, is but meagre and unsatisfactory. Such, however, as it is, I 
offer to you for publication, because this tribute, however feeble, is the fullest 
that has yet been paid to his memory, and because it may serve, to stimulate 
the inquiries, of some more diligent and successful biographer. 
I am very truly, and fraternally yours, 

HENRY C. DEMING. 



ORATION. 



I RISE to encounter no forbidding glances, to dis- 
cern in no Iiostile or averted look the bias of sect 
or tlie bigotry of party. Divided sentiments and 
conflicting opinions are not to be harmonized here. 
One in gratitude, we are one in thought and feeling. 
In unreserved fellowship, every mind, heart and 
hand, have united in placing a stone upon the spot, 
where for more than three-quarters of a century, 
courage and patriotism have slept unhonored. 

The grave of Wooster is no longer unmarked. 
No longer do his ashes slumber among a thankless 
people. The State to its child, its bulwark and 
martyr. Masonry to the master-builder of its oldest 
temple, and Danbury to its self-sacrificing avenger, 
have at length yielded the slow tribute of a monu- 
ment. High in its commanding position, it now 
overlooks the commonwealth he served and the field 
on which he fell ; it proclaims to the South his devo- 
tion as a patriot, to the East his fidelity as a brother: 
the arms of the State with its God-trusting motto, 
and the emblems of military heroism, appropriately 



honor and embellish it : it stretches far up toward 
that heaven to which his faith aspired, and it is 
fittingly surmounted by the glorious bird which he 
helped to make the symbol of victory, and the invin- 
cible standard-bearer of the Republic. 

"Long in its shade shall children's children come, 
And earth's poor traveler find a welcome home ; 
Long shall it stand and every blast defy, 
Till heaven's last whirlwind rends the sky."l 

Amidst war and havoc, through these streets that 
were then only marked by the blackened and still 
smoking ruins of wiiat once were dwellings, while 
most of the inhabitants of this village were homeless 
wanderers upon the surrounding hills, a few weep- 
ing followers slowly and silently bore the ashes of 
WoosTER to their obscure rest. We stand w here our 
afflicted fathers stood, but graceful habitations have 
risen from the ruins, happiness and prosperity smile 
upon this scene of their desolation, peace has revis- 
ited the land, and with none to molest or make us 
afraid, beneath a benignant sky, and with every aus- 
picious omen, we are here to recelebrate the funeral 
and restore the grave. Soldiers ! let the escort, the 
dirge and the volley be such as are due to the chief- 
est among you. Grand Master ! accord your amplest 
honors; for seventy-seven years not even a sprig of 
cassia has marked the silent mound where rested the 



1 This poetical waif was picked up by my friend W. W. Eaton ; we are both 
ignorant to whom it rightfully belongs. 



ashes of your eldest brother. Citizens! welcome the 
day that wipes a stain from the character of the 
State : our chief magistrate attends to invest all that 
is mortal, of Washington's companion and Trumbull's 
friend, with the distinctions of the tomb. Recalled 
as we are to-day, after such long forgetfulness, to the 
heroic devotion of one, who though bowed with the 
infirmities of age, wooed death in his country's cause 
with more than youthful daring, I should be false to 
the occasion, to the living and the dead, if even for a 
moment, I beguiled your thoughts from any other 
theme, than the character and career of Gen. David 
WoosTER. Let the hours of this day — let, certainly, 
the flying moments of the present hour, be sacred 
to his memory alone ! 

When we look for the origin of his military ser- 
vices to the commonwealth, we must go back to the 
period when an infant colony, not yet " hardened 
into the bone of manhood," against a rugged soil, a 
rude climate, and civilized and savage foes, was 
struggling for existence ; when Crown Point and 
Williamstown and Schenectady were the frontiers 
of civilization, and only Indian pathways traversed 
the scene of warlike operations; when cultivation 
had, as it were, only dotted the wilderness, and 
provisions were to be brought from widely separated 
fields, and munitions of war from beyond the seas, 
and time and space, as yet unvanquished by elec- 
tricity and steam, had both to be conquered by the 



soldier and the commissary, ere the enemy could be 
reached. We must go back to the period when 
flying artillery, revolvers and repeating rifles were 
unknown, and the cumbrous queen's arm, almost 
as fatal at the breech as at the muzzle, was the 
most efficient weapon of the soldier. 

In following up these military services we must 
accompany him for nearly forty years, through four 
wars, with Spain, with France, with France again, 
and finally with England. We shall see, inciden- 
tally, as we pass along, a part of the grand procession 
of causes which heralded Freedom and Independence 
to this Western World ; the habit of co-operation 
taught by the early colonial wars; the military 
education of our fathers; the conquest of Canada; 
the expulsion of the French, and the insane revenue 
policy of the parent state. In the Revolutionary 
struggle, Wooster's path, unfortunately, only pene- 
trated the clouds and darkness of the opening night; 
it ends just as the morning of victory broke in 
auroral splendor. If he had been permitted to live 
one half-year longer, if he had been more thoughtful 
for himself and less faithful to you, the great heart 
which w^as then moldering in yonder grave-yard, 
would have leaped in exultation, at the surrender ot 
Burgoyne. 

David Wooster was born at Stratford, on the 
second of March, 1710-11, old style, the son of 
Abraham and Mary Wooster, and the youngest of 



six children.' Reared in the Puritan principles and 
training of that era, the discipline of his early years 
was severe and sober. He graduated at Yale Col- 
lege, in 1738. He had but just reached his twenty- 
seventh year, when England, in violation of treaty, 
and for the shameful purpose of monopolizing the 
slave-trade to the Spanish colonies, declared war 
against Spain. Innumerable pirates and smugglers 
had been invited to the American seas, by the 
protection which the British flag extended to an 
infamous traffic. Disturbed, however, in their adven- 
tures, by the unexpected war, and by the vigilance 
of the numerous Spanish cruisers employed in the 
preventive service, these reckless sea-robbers did 
not hesitate to levy contributions along the whole 
American coast, and on a people under whose flag 
they professed to sail. To provide against a descent 
upon our exposed seaports, not only by the Spanish 
coast-guards, but by the buccaneering enemies of 
the human race, the General Assembly of Con- 
necticut, at its May session in 1740, ordered a sloop 
of war to be built and equipped. Within the year 

1 Euth, daughter of Abraham and Mary, born September 26th, 1 700. 
Joseph, son " " " January 16th, 1702. 

Sarah, daughter " " " April 2d, 1705. 

Mary, " " " " " 3d, 1707. 

Hannah, " " " " February 23d, 1709. 

David, son " " " March 2d, 1710-11. 

For the genealogy of the Wooster family, as -well as for many valuable sugges- 
tions and references respecting the life of Gen. "Wooster, I am indebted to Mr. 
E. C. Herrick, Librarian of Yale College. 



8 

the sloop was launched at Middletown, and appro- 
priately named the Defense. Here, in the first war- 
vessel ever built by his native colony, we first meet 
David Wooster; here was the commencement of 
his long career of public service. Of the sloop De- 
fense,' he was appointed lieutenant, and afterward 
captain. In this vessel we find him from 1T41 to 
1743, young, ambitious, and (if we may trust his 
portrait) handsome, cruising between Cape Cod and 
the capes of Virginia, (for such were the limits 
assigned by the resolution of the General Assem- 
bly,) taking the inner passage through the Sound; 
as he passes the rock-bound shores of old Connecti- 

1 At the May session, 1741, Capt. George Phillipse was aiipointcd captain of 
the sloop Defense, and David Wooster her lieutenant. The wages of the 
captain were fixed at seven shillings per day; those of the lieutenant at four 
shillings, sixpence ; the warrant officers at two shillings, sixpence, and all others 
at one shilling, sixpence. 

October, 1741. Capt. Phillipse ordered to discharge the men and lay up 
the sloop in New London. 

May, 1742. At this session ordered that the sloop be refitted, manned, and 
to cruise from the capes of Virginia to Cape Cod. 

October, 1742. Capt. David AVooster, commander of the sloop Defense, 
ordered to discharge the men and lay up the sloop at New London. 

Mav, 1743. The entire control and management of the sloop committed 
to the Governor and Council. 

May, 1744. Sloop ordered to be manned again, the officers -and men to be 
instructed, and to be ready for a cruise. 

October, 1744. New spars, sails and cables ordered. 

May, 1746. A memorial from Jolm Roberts, showing that the sloop Defense, 
on the expedition to Louisburg, landed men at a place called Cape Ann, on the 
island of Cape Breton, and captured i)lunder. 

Also a petition from David AVooster, late commander of Defense, asking for 
remuneration for also acting as purser. 



cut, riuining into New London for stores and sup- 
plies from the ship's commissary, Gurdon Salton- 
stall ; running into New Haven on a stolen visit 
to Mary, who was yet to be his bride ; looking into 
the bays of Long Island, and the inlets of the Jerseys, 
in search for pirates, and then standing away for 
the capes of Virginia. He hopes all the time that 
some Spanish argosy with doubloons, from Havana 
to Cadiz, would be driven so far northward of her 
course. He searches the horizon for some Spanish 
cruiser, not more than double the Defense in metal 
and men, and when, without any adventure, the 
headlands of Virginia heave in sight, he changes his 
course and returns to New London, to discharge his 
crew, or to drill and discipline them, as the General 
Assembly shall order. During this alarm, so faith- 
fully did he execute the duties of guardian of the 
coast, that although neighboring colonies were fre- 
quently ravaged, the shores of Connecticut were 
unpolluted by any piratical invasion. 

While WoosTER was employed in this humble 
service, the Avar that originated in a mere question 
of colonial commerce, and which at the outset, was 
confined to these distant colonies, grew into a gen- 
eral struggle of Europe, involving all the principles 
on which her states are founded, and desolating 
the four quarters of the globe. The Pragmatic 
Sanction, which settled the throne of Austria on 
Maria Theresa, was solemnly guarantied by all the 



10 

principal sovereigns of Europe. But the crown ^Yas 
hardly placed on her brow, before Frederick of 
Prussia and Louis of France conspired to despoil 
of her hereditary dominions, one whose sex, youth 
and beauty presented the strongest claims to their 
protection, even if they had not been bound to her, 
by the sanctity of treaties, and the oaths of kings. 
England remained true to the house of Hapsburg. 
Both hemispheres are plunged in war. And as one 
of the direct results of royal perjury, thousands in 
the remote, valleys of Connecticut, who would have 
otherwise descended in green old age to where — 

"The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep," 

shed their young life-blood on battle fields from 
Detroit to Louisburg, and found early graves in the 
snows of Canada, and the tropical sands of the West 
Indies. 

On this side of the Atlantic the lightning struck 
before the thunder was heard. Louisburg, on the 
island of Cape Breton, was the camp and arsenal 
of French dominion in America, and the scourge 
of the English. From it issued the French and 
Canadians, on their errands of massacre and pillage; 
from it sped those cruisers that swept our coasters 
from the seas, and annihilated our fisheries; from it 
now burst the war-storm upon one of our frontier 
settlements. At this time, Massachusetts was gov- 
erned by the resolute and adventurous Shirley. 



11 

He conceived the bold idea of striking a blow at 
this terror and wonder of our primitive forefathers, 
of uniting the seven Northern colonies in an expe- 
dition that should drive the plowshare OAer the 
strongest fortress north of the Gulf of Mexico. It 
was an enterprise more formidable then, and more 
unequal to the comparative resources of the two 
periods, than would be now, an armament from the 
same states for the capture of Gibraltar, or the 
emancipation of Hungary. The colonies embraced 
this plan with unexampled unanimity and zeal. 
It even assumed the character of an Anti-Catholic 
crusade. Louisburg w-as not only the head-quarters 
of a hostile race, but of a hated- religion. A Romish 
priest had marshaled and led her Indians against 
our Protestant brethren on the frontiers. The cele- 
brated Whitfield, then on his third tour through 
New England, blew these sparks into a flame. He 
inscribed on a banner, "^ Nil desperandiun Christo 
duce'' and presented it to a New Hampshire regi- 
ment. One of the chaplains carried a hatchet, 
which he had consecrated to the purpose of hewing 
down the images in the enemy's churches. Under 
such powerful stimulants, the colonists taxed their 
strength to the utmost, and exhausted their re- 
sources. New York, Pennsylvania and New Jersey 
contributed lavishly, money and munitions of war; 
New England as lavishly, men. Connecticut, never 
backward in such emergencies, sent an entire regi- 



12 

ment to Loiiisburg, under the command of Roger 
Wolcott, one of those massive characters hewn out 
by nature for the foundation of states, a man who 
without one day's schooHng, rose from a w^eaver's 
shuttle, to the highest civil, military and judicial 
honors. 

Into this scheme, having for its object the present 
and permanent safety of all the Northern colonies, 
WoosTER entered with all the affluent zeal of an 
ardent and unselfish nature. He was among the 
first to volunteer in the cause ; he w^as among the 
first to receive a captain's commission. He was 
the first to recruit artd arm his company, and report 
it ready for service. The month which immediately 
preceded his departure upon this expedition, was 
perhaps the one of all others to which his mind 
reverted with the tenderest emotion, while he lay 
here at the gates of death, in the fatal spring of 1777. 
For on the 6th of March, 1745, he was married to 
Mary, the daughter of the Rev. Thomas Clap, 
President of Yale College, a wife who from the 
date of her nuptials till she followed him to the 
s^rave, clove to his fortunes with all a woman's 
unfaltering constancy and devotion. About the same 
period also, he purchased the old homestead in New 
Haven,' on the street which now bears his honored 

1 Alfred H. Terry, Esq., of New Haven, was kind enough to examine the 
New Haven records, and found tliat the deed conveying the old Wooster place 
to David Wooster, was dated January 18th, 1744-5; consideration, £800. 



13 

name, and there established his household gods for 
the remainder of his days. 

The Connecticut troops sailed from New London 
on the 11th of April, 1745,' in eight transports, under 
the convoy of the colony's sloop of war Defense,^ and 
on the last day of the same month the united arma- 
ment of the Northern colonies, consisting of one 
hundred vessels, rounded the point of Chapeaurouge 
Bay, and anchored in sight of Louisburg. They 
were here, most fortunately, joined by his majesty's 
squadron, under Admiral Warren. William Pep- 
perell, of Maine, an opulent merchant, but with no 
aptitude for martial exploits, save uniform good luck, 
was the commander-in-chief of the combined forces, 
Roger Wolcott, of Connecticut, was second in com- 
mand. Neither officers nor soldiers were at all 
skilled in that splendid science of modern times 
which has blotted out the word " impregnable" from 
our tongue, and reduced the capture of the strongest 
fortresses to a mere question of time. But if Pep- 
perell could not rely upon military art, he had a 



1 Wolcott papers. 

2 Dr. Dwight, in his statistical account of the city of New Haven, states in 
his short notice of Gen. Wooster, that in the year 1745, "he commanded the 
Connecticut sloop of war, and was employed to convey the Connecticut troops 
to Louisburg, and in company with a sloop of war from Rhode Island, engaged 
the Renounce, a French frigate of 36 guns," &c. 

Prof. liingslcy, in his Historical Discourse, repeats the same statement. 

This is incorrect. "Wooster was not captain of the Defense, the onl}- Con- 
necticut sloop of war that went to Louisburg, as late as 1745. Capt. John 
Prentiss commanded the Defense on the Louisburg expedition. V. War 
Papers, 11, 



14 

tower of strength in the courage and hardihood of 
his troops. His artillery was dragged by human 
strength, over morasses and up rocky hills, impassa- 
ble to wheels. Shanties of bush and turf were the 
only tents of the men; the earth their only bed, and 
disease a^i as more fatal than the enemy's fire. The 
royal battery on shore was abandoned at the ap- 
proach of the New Hampshire regiment. Five un- 
successful attempts were made to carry an island 
battery, which, far in advance of the main defenses, 
held the squadron at bay. It still frowned defiance 
at the fleet, while back of it the cannon thundered 
from the shore, and back of all, surrounded by its 
moat of twenty yards, towered forty feet high, the 
walls of the stronghold, ail enfiladed by the guns of 
the bastions. Hope was rapidly yielding to despair. 
Fortunately the garrison was feeble and mutinous, 
provisions scarce, and the only ship relied upon for 
supplies, had been captured by Warren, and more 
than all, Duchambeau, its governor, was weak, irres- 
olute, cowardly. While the colonists were at the 
very point of hazarding the fate of the expedition on 
the desperate chance of carrying these formidable 
works by storm, the French governor, more despond- 
ing than the besiegers, sent out a flag of truce with 
an offer to surrender. The terms proposed were 
speedily accepted. On the 19th of June, the forty- 
eighth day of the siege, the fortress and city capitu- 
lated ; and the next Sunday, a Puritan chaplain (it 



15 

might have been the very one that bore the hatchet) 
preached against the real presence, before the high 
altar of a Catholic cathedral. The heart of Roger 
Wolcott sunk within him as he entered the strong- 
hold and viewed "the great guns, the moat and the 
batteries." "Why speak of men?" says he, in a 
strain of pious gratitude; "it is God that has done it, 
and the praise belongs to him alone; God, hearing 
the prayers of his people, by many signal instances 
of mercy, has led us on, from step to step to vic- 
tory."' 

I can not pass from this siege without calling your 
attention to the auspicious coincidence that this cita- 
del of the French surrendered to a league of the 
colonies on the ITtli of June, and that on the same 
day, just thirty years after, was fought the battle of 
Bunker's Hill. Col. Gridley, who planted the mor- 
tar, which on the third trial dropped a shell into the 
citadel of Louisburg, marked out the lines of the 
famous redoubt on Bunker's Hill. Seth Pomeroy, 
the oldest brigadier in the Continental service, who 
walked over Charlestown Neck, through the cross 
fire of the enemy's ships and floating batteries, to 
the same blood-stained heights, and Col. Fry, after- 
ward a brigadier in the same service, who plunged 
into the fight, cheered by this omen, were both 
at Louisburg.2 Wooster and Whiting, from Con- 

1 Wolcott Papers. 

2 Everett's Oration at Worcester, 4th of July, 1833. 



16 

necticut, were there. So early was Providence mar- 
shaling the causes and forging the thunderbolts of 
the Revolution. 

WoosTER seems to have won all the laurels at this 
famous siege, which could be plucked from such a 
demoralized and panic-stricken foe. No subaltern 
was more conspicuous for courage, resolution and 
martial bearing, while the following incident secured 
him an unequaled reputation for spirit and chivalry. 
A British captain had ventured to apply his ratan 
quite freely to the shoulders of one of Captain Woos- 
ter's men, a respectable freeholder and church-mem- 
ber from Connecticut. Wooster remonstrated with 
the regular for so grossly abusing official superiority. 
The Briton resented this advice in unmeasured 
terms, and finally drew his sword to chastise the 
adviser upon the spot. Wooster successfully parried 
his thrusts and speedily disarmed him. Applying 
his own sword to his adversary's breast, he told him 
that the life he had justly forfeited, could only be 
redeemed by asking pardon, and promising that he 
would never again disgrace with a blow, any soldier 
in the service. The terms were accepted without a 
parley. The jeers of his companions soon drove the 
officer from the army, while Wooster won the title 
of the soldier's protector and friend.^ In considera- 
tion of the gallantry and gentlemanly deportment of 
Capt. Wooster, he was intrusted with the command 



1 Am. Hist. Mag., p. 57 ; communicated by Deac. Nathan Beers. 



17 

of a cartel ship that was to convey the trophies and 
prisoners to England/ The year had been a disas- 
trous one to the British arms. The fail of Louisburg 
was the only event which redeemed its misfortunes. 
The ministry were amazingly in want of victories 
and heroes. Capt. Wooster was received in London 
with extraordinary exultation. His portrait adorned 
the walls of the coffee houses, and the pages of the 
magazines.^ He was followed, feted, presented to 
court, and gladdened with the sunshine of the royal 
smile. He was more substantially rewarded. A 
captain's commission in his majesty's service was 
graciously given to the future commander-in-chief 
of the Connecticut rebels.^ With the exception of 
the author and the lieutenant-general of the expe- 
dition, he Avas the only individual engaged in it that 
received any marks of ministerial condescension. 
Wooster returned to this country by packet to Bos- 
ton. Impressed while abroad Avith the necessity of 
some tie that should unite all mankind in a vmiversal 
brotherhood, he now procured from the Provincial 
Grand Lodge of Massachusetts, a charter, which first 
introduced into this colony that Light which has 
since warmed so many widows' hearts, and illumined 
so many orphans' pathway. Under this charter, 
Hiram Lodge was organized, in 1750, and Wooster 
appointed its first master. 

1 Conn. Journal, May 14tli, 1777. 

2 Lossing's Field-book. 

3 Conn. Journal, May 14tli, 1777; Doc. Hist, of New York, vol. 4, p. 824. 

2 



18 

The fourth intercolonial war, generally called the 
French and Indian War, now approached — the war 
which, by Ihially sweeping the French from this 
continent, removed the first great barrier to the inde- 
pendence of the states. It grew out of the hollow 
peace patched up at Aix-la-Chapelle, in 1748. The 
boundaries defined by that treaty were so uncertain 
and equivocal, that they only served as pretexts and 
provocations to fresh hostilities. Each party en- 
croached upon territory which, under its provisions, 
the other claimed. The settlements thus planted by 
Saxon and Gaul, were backed up by both with mili- 
tary force. Hard words, blows, bloodshed, followed. 
The parent countries were dragged into the conflict, 
and thus all-seeing Destiny opened the school in 
which Washington, Gates, Putnam, Stark, Wooster, 
Prescott, Montgomery, Lee, Mercer, and a host of 
others, were educated and disciplined for the iiery 
ordeal of the Revolution. During the seven years 
of this final and decisive struggle with France, our 
feeble colony — Lacedfi^mon of the West — in various 
expeditions, sent forth upward of 13,000 meji, more 
than one-tentli of her entire population, more than 
one-fifth of her male adults. When I reflect that to 
every call from the crown in this war, Connecticut 
responded with more than her quota in money and 
men ; when I rellect that she again decimated her 
population, and exhausted her means and her credit, 
in the Revolutionary conllict; I am proud to feel that 



19 

she lias fairly earned the discriminating- commenda- 
tion of Mr. Bancroft, when he says: "No state in the 
world has such motives for publishing- its historical 
records; partly because none in tlie world has run a 
fairer or happier or more unsullied career than Con- 
necticut, partly because tlie modesty of those who 
have gone before you has left unclaimed much of the 
glory due to her, and partly that it is only in the past 
that you find the Connecticut people an undivided 
whole ; since then, her increase in numbers has been 
so disproportioned to her original territory, that her 
citizens, or their descendants, are scattered all the 
way from Wyoming to the mouth of the Oregon."' 

The first expedition under Gen. Lyman, of Suflield, 
commanding provincials, and provincials only, from 
Connecticut and Massachusetts, on the Stli of Sep- 
tember, 1755, near the transparent waters of the 
Horicon, fought one of the bloodiest and most hardly 
contested battles of the whole v» ar, in which Dies- 
kau, the flower of French chivalry, was cut to pieces 
with his entire army. I regret exceedingly that I 
can not place Wooster's name on this splendid page 
of our colonial history. I can not discover that he 
served in this campaign; and can only account for it 
on the supposition that he was upon active duty else- 
where, with Col. Pepperell's regiment, to which the 
captain's commission from the king attached him. 

1 Letter from George Bancroft to J. Hammond Truml)u!], compiler of Colo- 
nial Records of Connecticut, dated February, 1851. 



20 

But after the most careful research into cotemporary 
chronicles, I have been unable to verify the hypoth- 
esis. 

In 1756, as colonel of the third regiment of Con- 
necticut, WoosTER joined at Albany ten thousand 
regulars and provincials — the finest army yet seen in 
America — designed, under the guidance of the Earl 
of Loudon, to capture Ticonderoga and Crown Point, 
and drive the French beyond the St. Lawrence. 
But at Albany, from early spring until August, the 
Coimecticut troops waited for their sluggish com- 
mander, who was loitering away in New York, the 
precious moments of action ; w^aited idle, half-starved 
and decimated by the small-pox, until his lordship 
arrived, too late in the season for a northern cam- 
paign. Nothing remained but for such of our men 
as disease had spared to return to their homes. 

The next year a third levy of five thousand troops 
was drawn from Connecticut, for the reduction of the 
same posts, wdiich the inefiiciency of the British gen- 
erals had spared in the preceding campaign. Col. 
WoosTER again marched his regiment from New 
Haven to the head-waters of the Hudson.' Aber- 

1 No resolution of the General Assembly can be found ajiijointing Colonel 
"WoosTER as colonel in the expedition of 1758. On the contrary, it appears tliat 
a resolution introduced into the Senate, appointing the field-officers, contains 
among- other names, that of Eleazcr Fitch, as colonel of the third regiment. It 
went into the House, and was amended by striking out Eleazer Fitch and in- 
serting David Wooster. Council refused to concur, and a committee of 
conference raised ; no account of their report. In tlie War Papers, I find also a 
resolution appointing Eliphalet Dyer as colonel of the tliird regiment. But there 



21 



crombie, whom they afterward described as "one a 
child could outwit, and a popgun terrify," was the 
imbecile dispatched by the ministry to conduct this 
campaign. Reckless of everything but his own per- 



is no indorsement upon it to show that it was passed hy citlicr House or Senate. 
(8 War Papers, 159.) The records show also that Col. Dyer was appointed 
colonel of the third. 

It is probahle that for some reason or other Dyer declined to go, andWoosTEK 
was commissioned by the governor after the adjournment of the General Assem- 
bly ; power being always given to him to fill vacancies. That Wooster was 
there, and participated in the battle of the 8th of July, 1758, I think the following 
evidence will establish : 

1st. David Wooster presents his account for services in the campaign of 
1758. Among the credits in this account is one for cash received from General 
Abei-crombie, for guns lost by men killed in the action of the 8th of July, 1758, 
and items, charging services from May to November, 1758. War Papers, vol. 
8, p. 41. 

2d. I find also a hospital account, by which Col. Wooster's regiment is made 
debtor to his Majesty's Hospital .at Lake George, for one man in hospital, August 
24th, 1758. War Papers, vol. 8, p. 128. 

3d. In an abstract of stoppages of Connecticut troops at hospitals, I find this 
item: "Col. Wooster's regiment, Lake George, to 24th August, 1758.' 
War Papers, \o\. 8, p. 128. 

4th. The petition of Samuel Halt, Jr., of Stamford, shows the Assembly "that 
his son was a volunteer soldier in David Waterbury's company, Col. Wooster's 
regiment, and at the battle of Ticonderoga, said son received a wound in his hand 
and was discharged and sent home the 27th of Juli/ last past." The petition is 
dated 8th of April, 1759. War Papers, vol. 8, p. 175. 

5th. In a manuscript journal of this campaign, kept by the great-grandfather 
of the author, who as a captain of the Connecticut troops, led his company from 
Colchester, in this state, and who was afterward Col. Renr)/ Champion, and some- 
what known in the Revolutionary History of Connecticut, as the " Old Commis- 
sar_y," I find the following entry: "Oct. 18th, 1758, Coh Wooster's regiment 
went home." 

6th. Miss Polly Ogden, grand-daughter of Gen. AVoostek, remembers that 
Madam Wooster said that her husband was in the battle near Ticonderoga, and 
bai'cly escaped with his life. ' 



22 

soiial safety, without waiting for liis artillery, lie 
pushed forward the flower of his troops, over brush- 
wood, stum|)s of trees, and all sorts of rubbish, to 
storm a breastwork of logs, bristling with swivels, 
and flanked by cannon, behind which Montcalm, the 
bravest of the brave, lay, ^vith thirty-six hundred 
French and Canadians. The result can be readily 
foreseen; swivels and small arms mowed down offi- 
cers and men. Courage and intrepidity only ren- 
dered the carnage more terrible. Wooster led his 
regiment into the thickest of this storm. They stood 
up to the butchery with unfaltering pluck, and his 
own escape was one of the miracles of the battle- 
field. After this prodigal sacrifice of life to his in- 
competency, Abercrombie emerged from a saw-mill, 
two miles from the field, where he had been safely 
ensconced during the action, and in the extremest 
fright and consternation, hurried his army back to 
the foot of Lake George. With an abundant force 
at his disposal, to accomplish all the objects of the 
campaign, he merely wearied his troops there with 
laborious idleness, until the approach of winter per- 
mitted Wooster to return from the battle-field and 
the barracks, to where, in the mellow light of an 
October sun, curled the blue smoke of the old home- 
stead ; to the IJclds where his children gamboled ; to 
the pious wife who daily and nightly, in the church 
and the closet, had wrestled ^^ith Israel's God for 
his safe return. 

Before the next campaign opened, fortunately for 



23 

the English dominion in America, and for the great 
interests of human freedom, the ministry which had 
sent ignorance and cowardice to lead our armies, 
was hurled from power, and a man placed at the 
helm so born to command that he breathed into 
every servant of the state, the might of his own 
thoughts and the enthusiasm of his soul. William 
Pitt now made himself the heart of the British em- 
pire, and through her stagnant and decaying veins, 
sent in a vitalizing current, health, strength and 
energy. Under his auspices, the aspect of affairs 
upon this continent, was speedily changed. In the 
month of May, 1759, Col. Wooster led his regiment 
to Fort George, to join the memorable expedition 
under Gen. Amherst, which completed the conquest 
of Canada. 

I have before me a sermon which was preached 
to Col. Wooster and his regiment, in the North 
Church of New Haven, just prior to their departure.' 

1 The sermon is by the Rev. Samuel Bh-tl, V. D. M. The subject—" The 
importance of the divine presence with our host." Text, Exodus xxxiii. 15. 
"And he said unto him. If thy presence go not with me, carry us not up hence." 
The sermon closes with an address to Col. Woostek, the officers and soldiers. 
In the address to the Colonel, the following paragraph occurs : 

" You will always imagine as tliough you lieard your dear yoke-fellow, whom 
Providence has made your second self, to whom it must needs be a great Piece 
of Self-Dcnial to part with you upon such an Enterprise, I say you will ever 
imagine, as tho' you heard her entreating you saying, 'My true and loving 
Guide, and Protector, keep, ! keep not back your sword from Blood : The 
Success of your Sword with others, under God, is all the Hope left me, of being 
happy in tlie enjoyment of those privileges we have mutually shared ; to prevent 
my becoming a Sacrifice to the merciless Rage of tawny Savages who delight in 



24 

The " drum ecclesiastic," in those days, played the 
same inspiriting airs which had kindled the enthusi- 
asm of Scottish Covenanters, and led from victory 
to victory the old Ironsides of Cromwell. In these 
early colonial struggles, no company marched from a 
Connecticut village, without the holiest benedictions 
of the church. They were conjured to fight bravely 
for church and altar. They were told that God him- 
self hated the coward; that while "they were en- 
gaged in the field, many would repair to the closet, 
many to the sanctuary; that the faithful of every 
name would employ that prayer wdiich has power 
with God ; that the feeble hands which were unequal 
to any other weapon, would grasp the sword of the 
spirit, and that from myriads of humble, contrite 
hearts, the voice of intercession, supplication and 
weeping would mingle in its ascent to heaven, with 
the shout of battle and the shock of arms.'" 

Upon the advance of Gen. Amherst's forces, Ticon- 
deroga and Crown Point, the objects of so many 
fruitless campaigns, were abandoned by their gar- 
risons. But to guard against every contingency, 
this over-cautious commander detained his troops 
to repair and strengthen these important conquests. 

Blood, or being enslaved to a popisli Master. I cannot travel into the Field 
with you, but my Heart will be with you, and by the Help of divine Grace, I 
shall continually pray for you.' " 

In the same volume which contains this sermon (283 Pamphlets of Conn. 
Hist. Soc.) is another on the "curse of cowardice." 

1 Robert Hall to the volunteers of Bristol. 



25 

Meantime Wolfe fell in the arms of victory on the 
lieig'hts of Abraham. The meteor flag streamed from 
the battlements of Quebec. Montreal was the last 
foothold of the French in the Canadas. Earlv in the 
spring, Gen. Amherst, dividing his forces into two 
columns, directed them by different routes, against 
this distant post. Gen. Haviland led five thousand 
men by the way of Lake Champlain and the river 
Sorel, but the main army, ten thousand strong, to 
which Col. Wooster's regiment was attached, went 
by one of the longest and most laborious marches 
recorded in our military annals.' The state of New 
York, between Schenectady and the waters of Onta- 
rio, swarming now w^ith millions of people, the great 
track of commerce, and the home of industry, was 
then a wilderness, unbroken save by one military 
post. Over this immense stretch of forest and marsh. 
Col. WoosTER and his regiment toiled along from 
June till August, by such roads as are now known 
in the heart of Nebraska and Oregon. Arrived at 
Oswego, the army crossed Ontario in open galleys, 

1 I was for some time at a loss to dotennine whether Wooster went with 
Haviland or by way of Lake Ontario. No published account throws any light 
upon the point. But after a long search in the War Papers in the office of the 
Secretary of State, I found a "Hospital Bill," rendered against Col. Wooster's 
regiment, as Dr. to his Majesty's Hospital at Fort Ontario, (Oswego,) for men 
in hospital from July 24th to October 24th. 

There is another bill against him and his regiment for hospital services at Fort 
Oswegatchie, (near Ogdensburg.) These seem to settle the qnestion that he went 
by the St. Lawrence. 

There is abundant proof from distinct sources that Putnam and the other Con- 
necticixt regiments went by the same route. 



26 

to the point where the waters of our great inland 
seas first find an outlet to the ocean. From thence 
they thread their way, doubtful as to the channel, 
through those thousand islands, where for many a 
league the Naiad of the stream and the Dryad of the 
woods How on together, in joyful honeymoon. The 
troops capture and garrison all the military posts; 
they attack and take a French vessel of war; they 
lose men and batteaux and artillery in descending 
the great falls ; but on, on, they go, whirling through 
the rapids, and plunging down the cascades of this 
magnificent river, to the last retreat of the van- 
quished Gaul. Gen. Amherst arrived at Montreal 
early in September. Haviland's column soon reached 
it by Lake Champlain. Murray had ascended with 
the English army from Quebec. Twenty thousand 
Britons were concentrated before a town unprotected 
])y either walls or fortifications. Resistance would 
have been a wanton waste of life ; without a battle 
Montreal capitulated, and the French, with the ex- 
ception of a small and feeble settlement at the mouth 
of the Mississippi, were driven from the continent of 
North America.^ 

1 Some five j^eai's prior to this event, John Adams, then a musing student at 
Worcester, gave utterance to the following remarkable language : " All creation 
is liable to change. Mighty states are not exempted. Soon after the Refor- 
mation a few people came over into this new world for conscience sake. This 
ajiparently trivial incident may transfer the great seat of empire into America. 
If we can remove the turbulent Gallics, our people, according to the exactcst 
calculation, will become more numerous, within a century, than England itself. 
AH Eurojje will not be able to subdue us. The only way to keep us from setting 



27 

So confident was Choiseul, the keen-eyed premier 
of Louis XV., that the conquest of Canada would 
result in the speedy emancipation of these colonies, 
that after signing the treaty, surrendering New Fiance 
to the English, he exclaimed exultingly, " We have 
caught them at last."' 

The twelve years which followed the peace of 
1763,- embrace the longest period in his life, that 



lip for ourselves is to disunite us." " Within twcntj'-one years from this predic- 
tion," says Bancroft, in citing it, " this dreamer sliall assist in declaring liis 
country's independence ; in less than thirty years, after a career of danger and 
effort, he shall stand before the king of Great Britain, tlie acknowledged envoy 
of the free United States of America." 

1 Bancroft. 

2 I find in the fourth volume of Doc. Hist, of New York, a deposition from 
David Wooster, of New Haven, " being a Captain on Half-pay, reduced from 
his Majesty's 51st Reg. of Foot," in which the deponent goes on to state, that 
pui-siiant to his Majesty's Proclamation for that purpose, he obtained a grant, 
under the Great Seal of New York, for 3,000 acres of land on the East Bank 
of Lake Champlain ; tliat he went on to tlie land and found intruders upon it ; 
that he proceeded to serve writs of Ejectment upon two principal Bing-leaders, 
"and thereupon some of tlieir party pi-esented their Eirelocks at the Deponent, 
declaring that it should be Death for any man that served a declaration of Eject- 
ment there, but the Deponent, being Avell armed, with Pistols, proceeded to serve 
the said Ejectments, notwithstanding they continued their Firelocks presented 
against him dui-ing the whole time," &c. It was, doubtless, the object of the 
Deposition to show, that the comts of New York had exercised jurisdiction over 
the tract which was then in dispute between New York and New Hampsliire. 
Upon the adjustment of that controversy, Gen. Wooster probably lost his land. 
The deposition is dated 20th day of February, 1773. 

In the 12th volume of Col. of Mass. Hist. Society, page 217, I find an answer 
from Col. Wooster to the queries issued by the Board of Trade, relative to the 
present state and condition of the Colony of Connecticut. It is addressed to 
Gov. Trumbull, and dated New Haven, May 16th, 1774, and describes A\ith 
much particularity, the trade, commerce and manufactures of that place. 



28 

WoosTER was permitted to enjoy the happiness and 
the repose of the fireside. At this time he was rich. 
His family were afterward poor. Upon his return to 
New Haven from Canada, he had engaged in mer- 
cantile pursuits, which yielded quick returns and 
large profits. He had himself inherited an ample 
patrimony, and his bride, in addition to her other 
claims upon his admiration, possessed also those solid 
charms, wdiich were not entirely despised even in the 
heroic age of our ancestors. A salary was attached 
to the office of collector, which he then held, and he 
continued to draw his half-pay as captain in his 
majesty's service. From these various sources he 
derived an income wdiich enabled him to surround 
himself with all the comforts and luxuries of wealth. 
A uature amiable, affable, kindly, rejoicing in the 
sweets of friendship and the prattle of children, 
found now some recompense for the privations and 
dangers of a seven years' war. His style of living 
was in the highest elegance of the olden time. He 
spread a bountifid table, kept his horses, his phaeton, 
and a troop of black domestics. The old family 
mansion in Wooster street, then fairly isolated in the 
country, with an unobstructed prospect of the Sound, 
opened wide its doors in genuine hospitality. It was 
the resort of the learning, the talent, and the polish 

It appears from the New Haven Records, that Col. AVooster commamled the 
troops that paraded to celebrate the repeal of the Stamp Act, in 1766. 
Barlow, in the Columhiad, has this line : 

"And fearless Wooster aids the sacred cause." 



29 

of that era — the dawn of the Revolution. In the 
winter, the grateful heat of hickory blazed in its 
ample fire-places. In the summer, the gentle breezes 
from the Sound fanned the feverish brow, and at all 
seasons, the long side-board, loaded with the em- 
blems of cheer and good fellowship, welcomed every 
ffuest. Madam' Wooster was herself a heroine of 
the Revolutionary type, strong in mind, bold and 
earnest in character, and with a presence and man- 
ners so dignified and imposing as to awe into rever- 
ence the drunken Tories, who subsequently sacked 
her dwelling. The only drawback upon her felicity 
during the earlier years of her marriage, seems to 
have been that she could not personally share her 
husband's dangers in the field, and having now re- 
covered him, safe from war's alarms, she exerted 
her rare accomplishments to enhance the charms of 
peace. An only daughter," just budding into woman- 
hood, warmed the father's heart by her filial devotion, 
and lighted his dwelling with the social radiance 
which youth and beauty dispense. An only son,^ not 
yet faithless to the virtues of his sire, was comfort- 
ably settled in life, and promised fiiir to gratify 
paternal pride, and transmit an unblemished name. 
A retinue of faithful dependents, sailors who had 
cruised with him in the Defense, orderlies who had 

1 1 use this title because it was uniformly applied to her by her cotemporaries. 

2 Mary Wooster, born 1755, married Rev. John Cosius Ogden. 

3 Thomas Wooster, boi'n 1752, married Lydia Sheton. 



30 

been attached to his person in some of his numerous 
expeditions, old soldiers who had followed him to the 
wars, surround him in his moments of leisure,' appeal 
to him in their embarrassments, feed at his lavish 
board, and adore him as their benefactor and friend. ^ 
From these tranquil enjoyments, he was now sum- 
moned to that fnial struggle, of which the previous 
wars had been the faint and feeble harbinger. When 
the blood that was spilled in the streets of Lexington, 
closed forever the door of reconciliation, lie turned 
his back upon this domestic Eden, abandoned the 
prospect of commanding opulence, abjured his income 
from the crown, and accepted in their stead, toil, 
persecution, danger, and as the event proved, death. 
He even spurned the temptation of a high commission 
in the British army, which was earnestly pressed 
upon his acceptance,^ and to a feeble colony, with 
hardly cash enough in its treasury to equip him for 
the war, to a penniless Congress, which must issue 
bills of credit ere it could set a battalion in the fiekl, 
gratuitously proffered his services, to encounter the 
disciplined hosts and the exhaustless resources of a 
mighty empire. When it became apparent that war 
was inevitable, he did not even wait for official posi- 



1 These domestic details are from tlie reminiscences of Miss Polly Ogden, 
grand-daughter of Gen. Wooster, and from those of a venerable lady of Hart- 
ford, now deceased, a niece of Madam Wooster, and an inmate of her family 
from 1771 to 1778. 

2 Doratus Wooster, of Vermont, a relative of Gen. WoosTEn, has communi- 
cated many important facts to tlie author. 

3 From the reminiscences of Miss Ogden. 



31 

tion. He was one of that party of private Connecticut 
gentlemen, who, without committing the Legislature 
to any open act of hostility, planned the seizure of 
Fort Ticonderoga, and pledged their own personal 
securities to the state treasury, for the loan which 
defrayed the expenses of the expedition.' He thus 
participated in the first aggressive act against the 
crown. 

It was not till its May session in 1775, that our 
General Assembly threw oil" the guarded and equivo- 
cal language in which they had hitherto masked their 
warhke preparations, and in plain terms ordered one- 
fourth part of our militia to be armed and equipped 
for immediate service. The force thus organized 
was divided into six regiments, and David Wooster 
appointed major-general and commander-in-chief, 
with Joseph Spencer and Israel Putnam as his brig- 
adiers. Active service immediately followed this 
appointment. At the solicitation of the Committee 
of Safety of New York, Wooster was ordered, 
with the troops under his command, to defend its 
metropolis against a threatened demonstration from 
the enemy. 

He was now sixty-five years of age. He was 
not unprepared for the casualties of battle. He 
had not postponed till this advanced period of life, 
the settlement of those momentous questions Avhich 

1 I believe that Gen. Wooster was not one of the signers of the notes Liiven 
to the state treasurer, but he was an active and influential participator in ttie 
project for the capture of Ticonderoga. 



32 

the soul's immortality suggests. But in early youth, 
before the mind is distracted with the cares and 
vexations of manhood, he had brought his reason 
and faith to accord the inspired claims of divine 
revelation. He accepted the Holy Scriptures as the 
only safe rule in this life, and the only sure guide to 
the next. He reposed his hope for a happy eternity 
upon the merits of an atoning Emmanuel. In 1732, 
when but twenty-two years of age, in the church of 
his birthplace, by a profession of Christianity, lie 
publicly assumed its vows and acknow^ledged its 
hopes.' I have alluded to the religious phase of 
Gen. Wooster's character, not only because a por- 
traiture of him would be imperfect without it, but as 
an appropriate introduction to the following incident. 
It reveals most significantly, whose blessing he in- 
voked when he first unsheathed his sword in a civil 
war; upon whose arm he leaned, and whose guid- 
ance he implored, when about to breast the dark and 
portentous cloud that lowered before him. It is from 
the lips of an eye-witness, a venerable citizen of New 
Haven, now no more, himself an officer of the Revolu- 
tion.'* "The last time I saw Gen. Wooster was in 

1 Rev. "William B. Weed, of Stratford, examined the reeords of the cliureh in 
Stratford, at my request, and communicated the fact in the text. 

The records of the clmrch of White Haven, (one of tlie churches that formed 
the United Society of New Haven,) show that Gen. Woosteu was transferred 
to its communion in I7G8, hy a commendatory letter from the church in 
Stratford. 

2 Am. Hist. Ma^., ]). 58, communicated by Deacon Nathan Beers. I have 
varied sliuhlly the phraseoloLjy. 



33 

Jane, 1755. He was at the head of his regiment, 
which was then embodied on the Green, in front of 
where the Center Church now stands. They were 
ready for a march, with their arms ghstening, and 
their knapsacks on their hacks. Col. Wooster had 
already dispatched a messenger for his minister, the 
Rev. Jonathan Edwards, with a request that he would 
meet the regiment and pray with them before their 
departure. He then conducted his men in military 
order into the meeting-house, and seated himself in 
his own pew, awaiting the return of the messenger. 
He was speedily informed that the clergyman was 
absent from home. Col. Wooster immediatelv 
stepped into the deacon's seat, in front of the pulpit, 
and calling his men to attend to prayers, offered 
up a humble petition for his beloved country, for 
himself, the men under his immediate command, 
and for the success of the cause in which they were 
engaged. His prayers were offered with the fervent 
zeal of an apostle, and in such pathetic language 
that it drew tears from many an eye and affected 
many a heart. When he had closed, he left the 
house with his men, in the same order they had 
entered it, and the regiment took up its line of 
march for New York. With such a prayer on his 
lips he entered the Revolution. 

We now find Wooster, during July and August 
of 1775, encamped at Harlem. The threatened 
attack upon New York had not yet been executed, 

3 



34 

but the summer, notwithstaDtling-, was a busy one 
for him. The British blockaded in Boston, and dis- 
tressed for provisions, laid under contribution Long 
Island and the islands in the Sound, contiguous 
thereto. Upon Wooster devolved the hard task, of 
guarding these exposed positions from the enemy's 
cruisers, and of assisting the defenseless inhabitants, 
to remove their cattle and crops, to a place of 
security. He is at Brooklyn, or Oyster Ponds, at 
Montauk, at Plumb Island, everywhere, hovering 
over the whole coast with his protecting wings. 

W^hile engaged in these useful but inglorious em- 
ployments, his enthusiasm met with an unexpected 
rebuff. The regiments Avhich tlie states had sepa- 
rately raised, were now received into the pay, and 
adopted as the army of the United Colonies. Under 
this new organization, Connecticut was entitled to 
one major-general, and to this grade. Gen. Putnam, 
Wooster's inferior in the colonial service, was pro- 
moted, while the commander-in-chief of the Con- 
necticut troops, was merely raised to the subordinate 
rank of brigadier. The slight was the more marked, 
because Wooster was the only colonial officer, thus 
overslaughed by the continental commissions. The 
blow was a severe one. It was the first wound to 
a soldier's keen sensibility to honor, that he had 
received in a military career of more than a quarter 
of a century. I have been so fortunate as to find 
the precise language, in which he expressed, the 
first bitterness of disappointed ambition — the earliest 



35 

grief of unrequited patriotism. Roger Sherman, at 
that time our delegate to Congress, had commu- 
nicated this information to him in a letter, which 
contained the following paragraph: "I am sensible 
that according to your colonial rank, you were en- 
titled to the place of major-general; and as one was 
to be appointed from Connecticut, I heartily recom- 
mended you to the Congress. I informed them of 
*he arrangements made by our Assembly, which I 
thought would be satisfactory to have them continue 
in the same order. But as Gen. Putnam's fame w as 
spread abroad, and especially his successful enter- 
prise at Noddle's Island, the account of which had 
just arrived, it gave him a preference in the opinion 
of the delegates in general, so that his appointment 
was unanimous among the colonies ; but from your 
known ability and firm attachment to the American 
cause, w^e were very desirous of your continuance 
in the army, and hope you will accept the appoint- 
ment made by Congress.'" To which Gen. Woos- 
TER thus replied : " No man feels more sensibly for 
his distressed country, nor would more readily exert 
his utmost effort for its defense than myself. My 
life has been ever devoted to her service, from my 
youth up, though never before in a cause like this, 
a cause for which I would most cheerfully risk, nay, 
lay down my life. Thirty years I have served as a 



1 The lettci' can be found in the second volume of Davis's Life of Aaron 
Burr, p. C. It is dated the 23d of June, 1775. 



36 

soldier; my character Avas never impeached, nor 
called in question before. The Congress have seen 
fit, for what reason I know not, to point me out as 
the only officer among all that have been commis- 
sioned in the different colonies, who is unfit for the 
post assigned him. The subject is a very delicate 
one.'" 

His misgivings, however, were but momentary ; 
he did not look back to the home he had left, to the 
position he had abandoned, to the British commission 
he had scorned. With true magnanimity he over- 
looked the personal aifront, and forgot himself for 
his country. In the month of October, in this same 
year, we find Wooster, (having accepted the Con- 
tinental commission,) with the troops of the Connec- 
ticut line at Ticonderoga, as a part of the ill-fated 
expedition against the Canadas. x4nd we here enter 
upon the most painful and trying period of his whole 
history. To command an army in a hostile country, 
demoralized by defeat, ill-armed, ill-fed, ill-clothed, 
ill-paid, ill-disciplined, entirely unerpial to the enter- 
prise in hand ; to be the one individual to whom its 
prayers and complaints are ultimately addressed, 
with no power to answer and relieve — the one too, 
upon whom an anxious and excited nation, imposes 
the odium of every misfortune and failure — are all 

1 Am. Hist. Ma^., p. G, dated "Camp near Xcw York, July ITtli, 1775." 
lie alludes in this letter to one wliieli he has written upon the same subject to 
Col. Eliphalct Dyer. It is very desirable to find this letter to Col. Dyer. 



37 

that kind of trial, which stretches to its extremest 
tension every emotion of the soul. And this was 
Wooster's position for eighteen months. The dis- 
asters and suffering of that memorable campaign, 
the disappointment of the high-raised expectations 
of the country, the blow that the cause of independ- 
ence received through its most decisive miscarriage, 
would singly have been sufficient to break down 
the strongest spirit. But in addition to his manifold 
anxieties as commander of the invading army, and 
his full proportion of the general sorrow, upon Woos- 
TER was heaped another burthen, more difficult for 
a high-spirited and generous nature to bear; the 
thanklessness, the arrogance and the insolence of his 
superior officer. Gen. Schuyler — the commander of 
the Northern department — indignities which could 
not be adequately resented, without jeopardizing the 
great interests which depended on their cordial co- 
operation. 

Upon his arrival at Ticonderoga, Wooster found 
that he had provoked the decided enmity of his 
immediate chief. Upon his march thither, he had 
permitted a few of his men to return home on fur- 
lough, and when he reached Fort George, he had 
ordered a general court-martial for the trial of all 
offenses that had occurred during the advance of 
the brigade. These two acts were regarded by 
Gen. Schuyler as flagrant violations of his preroga- 
tive, and he addressed a letter to Wooster, couched 



/ 



38 

in the sharp language of rebuke. "In spite of my 
earnest persuasions," was Wooster's conclusive re- 
ply, "the troops under my command have refused 
to sign the continental articles of war, and if gov- 
erned at all, they must be governed by the law 
martial of Connecticut, under which they were 
raised. If there has been any infringement upon 
etiquette, it was forced upon me by the imperious 
exigencies of the case, without intentional disre- 
spect." But no answer could be satisfactory to 
Schuyler. He would neither forget nor forgive this 
fancied affront, but professed to see in it conclusive 
proof of a design on Wooster's part, by virtue of 
his colonial commission, to supersede Montgomery, 
who was his senior brigadier in the continental line. 
He even ventured peremptorily to demand of Woos- 
TER, as a condition precedent to his further advance, 
that he should give a direct answer to the question, 
whether he considered himself above or below Gen. 
! Montgomery, in rank? "I have the cause of my 
I country too much at heart," was Gen. Wooster's 
patriotic and uiirullled reply, "to attempt to make 
any difficulties and uneasiness in the army, upon 
which an enterprise of almost infinite importance is 
now depending. I shall consider my rank in the 
army, Avhat my commission from the Continental 
Congress makes it, and shall not attempt to dispute 
the command with Gen. Montgomery."' lie was 

1 Third Am. Arch., fuurtli scries, 1107. 



39 

now graciously permitted to proceed, but lie had 
hardly arrived at St. John's, before Schuyler fol- 
lowed him with the following extraordinary note: 

"TicoNDEROGA, Oct. 23d, 1775. 
"Sir: Being well informed that you have declared 
on your way to this place, that if you were at St. 
John's, you would march into the fort at the head 
of your regiment, and as it is just that you should 
have an opportunity of showing your prowess and 
that of your regiment, I have desired Gen. Mont- 
gomery to give you leave to make the attempt if you 
choose. I do not wish, however, that you should 
be too lavish of your men's lives, unless you have 
a prospect of gaining the fortress. 

"I am sir, your most humble servant, 

"PHILIP SCHUYLER."^ 

No notice was taken of this surly and offensive 
missive, until some months afterward, when Gen. 
Schuyler had foolishly complained to Congress of 
the unbecoming language which Wooster used in 
his dispatches. Provoked at such a charge, -from 
such a source, Wooster then says: "You will re- 
member your letter to me while I was at St. John's, 
founded in falsehood, and which you could have no 
other motive in writing but to insult me. I thought 

1 IV. Am. Arch., fourth series, 1008. 



40 

it at the time, not worth answering-, and shall at. 
present take no further notice of it.'^' 

As if effectually to belie the ung-enerous suspicions 
of Gen. Schuyler, harmony, which had left the army, 
was recalled to it when Wooster joined. He co- 
operated heartily with Montgomery in the execution 
of all his plans. To their joint exertions, the capit- 
ulation of St. John's was due ; they jointly attacked 
and dispersed the force under Sir Guy Carlton, 
which was hastening to its relief; they were joined 
in the resolution of Congress, which thanked them 
for these meritorious achievements. Together they 
marched upon Montreal. Wooster was left in com- 
mand of its garrison, while Montgomery advanced 
upon Quebec, and fell, never to rise again, in the 
desperate assault of the 31st of December. 

The death of his superior in the field, left Woos- 
ter in command of a defeated, dispirited, impover- 
ished army. With two thousand men he was called 
upon to achieve all the impossibilities demanded by 
the nation. He was to hold in subjection all the 
Canadas that had been overrun. With nothing but 
uncurrent continental bills, he was to clothe and 
equip his troops. He was to extort supplies from a 
people he was also directed to conciliate ; and with- 
out an artillery company, a battering train, a mortar, 
or an engineer, he was to reduce the strongest 
fortified city upon the globe. Eight hundred men 



1 IV. Am. Arch., fourth scries, 1217, 



41 

were all that could be spared for the operations 
agamst Quebec, and the madness of attempting to 
storm it with such a feeble remnant, did not require 
the failure of the recent experiment to demonstrate. 
For the approaches of a regular siege, the number, 
the character, and the equipments of the troops, 
were entirely inadequate. Nothing remained, but 
the third alternative, so distasteful and odious to 
every soldier, in which neither honor nor applause, 
nothing but reproaches, odium and misrepresentation 
were to be won; the slow, inglorious, wearying 
process of a blockade. In the fruitless attempt to 
starve out the garrison, before supplies could reach 
them, the tedious months of that long winter finally 
wore away. 

WoosTER had hardly entered upon the command 
before the ulcer in Schuyler's bosom opened afresh, 
and the fire in the rear re-commenced. Remaining 
himself safely at Albany, and sluggishly forwarding 
the supplies and provisions at his disposal, he pursued 
the officer who commanded in the enemy's country, 
with angry complaints, imperious mandates and in- 
sulting letters. He issued orders, and then, in a 
most peremptory tone, commanded Wooster to 
obey them, as if every previous order had been dis- 
regarded. He interfered with tlie internal regula- 
tion of the army and the police administration of 
the captured towns, and in other matters which 
exclusively pertain to the general in the field. Be- 
cause Wooster intimated that some of the prisoners 



42 

taken at St. John's, who liad been permitted to 
return, by permits from the commander of the 
northern army, were guilty of open acts of hostility 
to the American cause, Schuyler, with a total blind- 
ness to his own infirmity, accused him to Congress 
of writing "subacid" letters/ Throughout the whole 
correspondence, in courtesy, in forbearance, in gen- 
erosity, in patriotism, in everything becoming the 
gentleman and the officer, Wooster leaves his 
assailant immeasurably behind. Uniformly temper- 
ate and conciliatory in his language, when goaded 
to a point where forbearance ceases to be a virtue, 
he contents himself with informing his superior that 
" he too claims the right to be treated with the 
respect due to a gentleman, and an officer of the 
thirteen colonies." He challenges him to mention 
a command which has not been cheerfully obeyed; 
an order wiiicli has not been promptly fulfilled; to 
specify wherein he has failed to pay all proper 
respect to superior rank, or to exert every faculty 
for union, harmony, and the success of the cause. 
" No personal ill-treatment," says he, " will ever 
prevent my steadily and invariably pursuing those 
measures most conducive to the pubKc good." The 
controversy had now reached such a point, that the 
two officers could no longer continue in their relative 

1 The reader can examine the entire correspondenec scattered through IV. 
Am. Arch., fourth scries. The letters can be found l>v consulting titles " "NVoos- 
tcr" and " Schuyler," in the Index. 



43 

positions without serious detriment to the puMic 
service. Both united in referring their grievances 
to Congress; a committee was raised, and to the 
great joy of Woostek, he was recalled from a held 
where valor, self-denial and resolution, were only 
repaid A^ith ingratitude and odium. Within one 
month from his departure, the American army were 
driven out of Canada, not only defeated but dis- 
graced. WoosTER immediately repaired to Phila- 
delphia, and addressed to the President of Congress 
a letter to the following purport : " The unjust 
severity, and unmerited abuse, with which I have 
been assailed in the colonies, by those who would 
remove every obstacle to their own advancement, 
and the harsh treatment I have received from some 
members of the body over which you preside, ren- 
ders it necessary that I should vindicate my admin- 
istration of the army in Canada.' The honor of a 
soldier being the first thing he should defend, and 
his honesty the last he should give up, his character 
is always entitled to the protection of the virtuous 
and the good. I have therefore to request, that a 
committee may be appointed to examine thoroughly 
into my conduct in Canada, that I may be acquitted 
or condemned, on just grounds, and sufficient proof." 
A committee w^as accordingly raised, and it is un- 
necessary to say that the result of a most thorough 

1 I am obliged to abbreviate this letter ; the whole of it may be found VI . 
Am. Arch.. 1081. 



44 

investigation, was an unconditional acquittal of all 
blame. Impartial history lias ratified the verdict, 
and charged our misfortunes in Canada, not to the 
officers in command, hut to the absolute and entire 
inadequacy of the means placed at their disposal.' 
WoosTER returned to Connecticut, with the undimin- 
ished respect and confidence of his fellow-citizens, 
and as the Assembly had recently raised six brigades 
for home defense, he was again appointed by it major- 
general and commander-in-chief. With zeal un- 
chilled either by age or misfortune, he again entered 
the service of our commonwealth. Madam Wooster 
was frequently heard to repeat, that when her hus- 
band was called upon to lead the Connecticut troops 
against the enemy, he would say, "I can not go with 
these men without money," and would draw from his 

1 Hildrcth states tliat in consequence of dissatisfaction M'ith "Wooster's con- 
duct in Canada, he resigned, not liowever, until lie had obtained an inquiry and 
a favorahlc report. I can find no jiroof tliat he resigned his commission as brig- 
adier-general, unless such a presumption is raised by his accepting that of major- 
general from tlic General Assembly of Connecticut. 

The committee of incjuiry reported favoralily, August 17th, 177G. On August 
19th, 177f), he addressed the following letter to the Continental Congress, wliich 
shows that up to that day he had no intention of resigning. 

"August 19th, 1776. 

" Gent. : Having the pleasure and satisfaction of your approbation of my past 
conduct in the army, I beg leave to accpiaint your Honors that I am still ready 
and willing to serve in my proper rank in tlie army, and attend your further 
orders. 

" To Hon. the Continental Congress." 

IT. Am. Arch., fifth series. 

The resolution which directs the iiLscription for his monument, speaks of him 
as if he was " brigadier-general in the army of the United States," at the time of 
liis death. 



45 

own funds, and pay both officers and men, taking- 
their receipts for the same. The papers and vouch- 
ers for these disbursements were all destroyed when 
the British pillaged her house, in 1779, and this 
venerable and accomplished woman was, in her de- 
clining years, actually imprisoned for debt, and the 
key of the jail turned upon her, from the impossi- 
bility of recovering the money her husband had ad- 
vanced to his suffering country/ 

On the morning of the 25th of April, 1777, twenty- 
six vessels, with the cross of St. George at their 
respective peaks, were seen under full headway, 
steering up the Sound. By noon they are standing 
in toward Norwalk islands, and by four o'clock they 
had dropped anchor in what is now known as the 
harbor of Westport. Two thousand men, infantry, 
cavalry and artillery, were immediately landed on 
Cedar Point, the eastern jaw of the Saugatuck's 
mouth. As the different companies land, they ren- 
dezvous on the beautiful hill that overlooks the 
Sound. Having here formed into close column, they 
pass through the little hamlet called Compo, until 
they reach the old county road, and follow it to the 
east, until it meets the road to this place, when they 
wheel off toward the north, guided by two imps, 
Stephen Jarvis and Eli Benedict, by name, born 
in Danbury, under a malignant star. The enemy 

1 I state this fact upon the authority of Col. James "Ward, of Hartford, w!:o 
remembers it. 



46 

establisli their quarters for the night about eiglit 
miles from their landing place, within the limits of 
the town of Weston. When it was known that 
William Tryon commanded the expedition, its des- 
tination and objects were readily divined. He was 
the tory governor of New York, and having a natural 
genius for such pursuits, was armed by his masters, 
with a firebrand instead of a sword, and employed 
as incendiary-general, in a predatory war. Connec- 
ticut was the chosen field of his glory. In 1777, 
he burnt Danbury ; in 1778, Fairfield and Norwalk, 
and used the torch freely in a piratical inroad against 
New" Haven, in 1779. We had fairly earned this 
enviable distinction. It was not from his own col- 
ony, but from Connecticut rebels, that the repose of 
his administration was most disquieted. Before his 
own constituents had spirit enough to drive him 
from the government, Wooster marched our militia 
into his capital and flaunted, " Qui transtulit sustinet'' 
in his fiice. From aboard the Asia, to which he 
finally fled, he could see the "Sons of Liberty," from 
Connecticut, that broke up the infamous press of his 
favorite Rivington, and for the first time inoculated 
New" York with patriotism.' He threatened a bom- 
bardment of the city if the troops from Fairfield 
county, under Gen. David Waterbury, that went 



1 I hiive found amoiis the jjixpers of Silas Deanc, one of our delegates to 
Coniircss, the original letter of the patriot Sears, giving an account of this 
expedition, which he organized in Connecticut. 



47 

down to welcome Lord Howe, upon his llight from 
Boston, were permitted to enter, and the hdvewarm 
provincial Congress of New York, echoed the threat. 
It was these timely visits that lirst introduced to his 
Excellency our humble State, and drew upon us 
afterward, such frequent tokens of his remembrance. 
His present advent was the first return visit with 
which he had honored us, and was the more marked, 
because it was the first time that a foreign invader 
had trod upon our soil. 

On the morning of the 26th, the quiet denizens 
of Reading on the Ridge, open their eyes in wild 
astonishment, at the unusual spectacle of red-coats 
filing through their streets, saluting the church as 
they pass, with a volley of canister and grape, from 
musketry and cannon. Tryon meets with no serious 
opposition thus far. The grisly visages of age, and 
woman's frightened face, are all that gaze from the 
windows, as his proud array passes along. Every 
fencible man had early taken the old queen's arm, 
from the pegs on which it hung, and hastened away 
to where a more formal reception was in preparation. 
But as Tryon ascends Hoyt's Hill, a few miles from 
hence, a serious obstacle presents itself in his path. 
A solitary horseman appears upon the brow, directly 
in the line of march, and waving his sword, and 
turning his head, as if backed up by a mighty army, 
exclaims in a voice of thunder, "Halt, the whole 
Universe! wheel into kingdoms!" The British come 



48 

to a stand ; flanking parties are sent out to investigate 
the precise position into which the "kingdoms have 
wheeled ;" the two pieces of artillery are brought to 
bear upon " the Universe," when the solitary horse- 
man, outflanked by these maneuvres, slowly turns 
about and disappears. It uas now about two 
o'clock in the afternoon ; the enemy had passed 
through Bethel's peaceful hamlet, and were now 
entering the south end of Danbury, when the solem- 
nity of the occasion was disturbed by another inci- 
dent, serving to show, that the comic and the tragic 
thread, are wove together in all human experience. 
A man by the name of Hamilton, had on deposit at 
a clothier's, in the lower part of the village, a piece 
of cloth, which he was determined at all hazards to 
rescue from sequestration. He' accordingly rode to 
the shop, and having secured one end of the cloth 
to the pommel of his saddle, galloped rapidly away. 
But he was seen by the enemy's light-horsemen, 
who followed hard upon him, exclaiming, "We'll 
have you, old daddy; we'll have you." "Not yet," 
said Hamilton, as he redoubled his speed. The 
troops gain upon their intended victim ; the nearest 
one raises his sabre to strike, when fortunately the 
cloth unrolls, and fluttering like a streamer, far be- 
hind, so frightens the pursuing horses that they can 
not be brought within striking distance of the pur- 
sued. The chase continues through the whole extent 
of the village, to the bridge, where, finally, the old 



49 

gentleman and the cloth make good their escape.^ 
Tryon established his head-quarters with a tory by 
the name of Dibble, whose residence was at the 
south end of Main Street, and in close proximity to 
the public stores. As the light troops were escorting 
Erskine and Agnew, the brigadiers of the command- 
ing general, to a house near the bridge, at the upper 
end of this street, four young men fired upon them, 
from the dwelling of Major Starr, situated about 
forty rods above the present court-house. The 
British pursued, slew them and a peaceable negro 
who was in their company, threw their bodies into 
the house and set it on fire. 

The destruction of the public stores now com- 
menced. The Episcopal church was filled to the 
galleries with barrels of beef, pork, rice, wine and 
rum. In order to save the building, these were 
removed into the street and consumed, and a white 
cross conspicuously marked upon the church, to 
protect it against the general conflagration, which 
Tryon had already foreordained. The gutters run 
with the melting pork. The air is thick with the 
fumes of burning beef The liquids are only spared 
from the flames, to be appropriated by the soldiers, 
to their own immediate refreshment. The commis- 
sioner of the army had, against his will, placed 
part of the provisions in the barn of Dibble, the 
tory. These are also carefully removed to the 

1 This story is told by Barber, Hinman, Lossing, and other chroniclers. 

4 



50 

street, the safety of the building insured by a cross, 
and the provisions spared, probably to be transferred 
to the loyalist, as rent for the forced occupation of 
his premises. But short work is made of another 
barn, used for the same purpose, but owned by a 
pariot. It was immediately set on fire and con- 
sumed, with all that it contained/ The soldiers 
now begin to feel the effects of their free indulgence 
in rebel rum. They lurch as they walk, they lie 
sprawling in the streets and the door-yards; but 
three hundred are fit for duty, as the curtain of 
night fills upon the indecencies of a general de- 
bai.ch. The firebrand had not yet been generally 
used, but the white cross, now seen distinctly on 
every tory's dwelling, indicates clearly enough that 
those unprotected by it, are already doomed. These 
faithful allies had intimated to Tryon, that the foe 
is gathering in tite neighborhood. His sleep is far 
from tranquil. Early on the Sabbath morning, while 
it was yet dark, the signal is given, and on a sudden, 
a lurid and unnatural glare chases night from the 
sky. The torch is carried from house to house, and 
from store to store. From the sacred recesses of 
home, from the roofs that guard the hard-earned 
savings of this frugal people, the fire breaks upon 
the surrounding darkness, and joins in the general 

1 "From tlic best inforniixtion whk'li can be obtained, there were about 3,000 
barrels of pork, more than 1,000 barrels of flour, several iuindrcd barrels of beef, 
1,600 tents, 2,000 liushels of grain, besides many otlicr lahiahle articles, such as 
mm, wine, rice, army-carriages, &c." — Robbinss Century Sermon. 



51 

havoc of the element. The aspiring- tongues of flame 
cUmb and curl round the spire of the Congregational 
church, until it totters and falls into the burnino- 
mass. The sun, as it rises, looks only upon the 
flickering embers of a once smiling village, save 
where here and there, a solitary house stood un- 
scathed, but branded with the indelible stigma, of 
harboring only traitors to freedom. By the cold light 
of early dawn, is seen, not the stealthy savage, but 
the disciplined army of a Christian king, stealing 
away from the desolation they had caused, and from 
the avenger on their heels, while the aged and the 
young, the sick, the helpless, and the infirm, gather 
round the smoldering ashes, for that warmth, which 
is all that is left of the comforts of home.' 



1 Nineteen dwelling-honscs, the meeting-house of the Xcw Danbury Society, 
and twenty-two stoi-es and bams, with all their contents, were consumed. — Rob- 
bins's Century Sermon. 

John McLeon, Eli Mygatt, and others, selectmen of Danbury, stated to tlie 
General Assembly, convened at Hartford, on the 8th of May, 1777, that the 
enemy, in their incursion into Danbury, burned and destroyed the public records 
of said town, and they apprehended great damage might arise to the inhal)itants, 
unless some timely remedy should be provided. The Assembly appointed Daniel 
Sherman, Col. Nehemiah Bcardsley, Increase Moseley, Lemuel Sanford, Col. S. 
Canficld, and Caleb Baldwin, to repair to Danbury, as soon as might be, and 
notify the inhabitants of said town, and by all lawful ways, inquire into and 
ascei-tain every man's riglit, and report to tlio next General Asscmldy. 

This committee reported to tlie Assembly that the British troops had made 
a hostile invasion into said town, and under a pretense of destroying the j^ub- 
lic stores, had consumed witli fire about twenty dwelling-houses, with many 
stores, barns, and other buildings, and that the enemy, on their retreat, collected 
and drove off all the live stock, viz., cattle, horses and sheep, which they could 
find ; and that the destruction of said property had reduced many of the wealthy 



52 

The intelligence of the enemy's landing was com- 
municated to WoosTER, at New Haven, on the morn- 
ing of the 26th. Arnold was fortunately there on 
furlough, who though finally a Judas, was, in mere 
bravery, second to no man in whom the breath of 

inhabitants to poverty. Having notified the inhabitants, they from day to day 
examined the losses of eacli sufferer, on oath, and by other evidence, and allowed 
to each his damage at the time said property was destroyed ; they found that by 
reason of the price of articles, the inhabitants had been obliged to pay large sums 
over and above the value, in procuring the necessaries for their families ; that 
many of them had their teams forced from them to remove the public stores, &c. 
Tliey gave the name of each sufferer, with his loss allowed, annexed to his name, 
which amounted to the sum of £16,181 1 4 — which report was accepted by the 
Assembly, and ordered to be lodged on file, to perpetuate the evidence of the loss 
of each person, that when Congress should order a compensation, to make out 
the claims of sufferers. 

On the receipt of this communication, the pay talilc were directed to draw an 
order on the treasurer for the sum of £500 in favor of the selectmen of Danbury, 
to relieve the immediate distresses of such persons who Avcre sufferers in Danbury, 
as aforesaid, who could not subsist without such relief. 

The Assembly also provided, that all persons who had been wounded in any 
action during the late incursion, should be paid out of the state treasury, all 
their reasonable expenditures for surgeons, medicines, boarding, and nurses. 

In 1787, the sufferers in Danbury, having received no further relief, again 
petitioned the General Assembly of Connecticut, upon which petition Hon. An- 
drew Adams, and otliers, were appointed a committee. 

The chairman of said committee reported, that for want of exhibits and doc- 
uments, they were unable methodically and correctly to state the facts or losses 
and estimate of damages ; and also for the want of proper certificates from the 
treasurer and secretary of state, to report what had already been done for their 
relief ; but wei'e of opinion that the houses and buildings and necessary house- 
iiold furniture, destroyed by the enemy, ought to be paid for by the state, at their 
just value ; and that the only manner in the power of the state, at that time, was 
to pay the same in Western lands — which report was, in October, 1787, accepted 
by the House, but rejected by the Upper House. 

Ui)On a memorial in 1791, of the inhabitants of the towns of Faii-field and Nor- 
walk, in Fairfield county, tlie great losses occasioned by the devastations of the 



53 

life was ever breathed. Both generals immediately 
proceed to the scene of operations. At Fairfield, 
they learn that Gen. Silliman had ordered all the 
militia that could be raised, to rendezvous at Read- 
ing. They follow on, spreading the alarm as they 
go, and soon arrived at Silliman's head-quarters. 
With the forces there assembled, they pursue the 

British during the war, were shown to the General Assembly ; on wiiich they 
prayed for remuneration from the state. The Assembly, in May, 1792, by a 
resolution, released and quit-claimed to the sufferers named on the state record, 
or to their legal representatives, if deceased, and to their heirs and assigns 
forever, 500,000 acres of land, owned by Connecticut, situated west of Penn- 
sylvania, bounded north on Lake Erie, beginning on the west line of said lands, 
and extending eastward to a line running northerly and southerly parallel to the 
east line of said tract of land owned by this state, and extending the whole width 
of the said lands, and easterly as far as to comprise said quantity of 500,000 
acres, (exclusive of former grants to sufferers, if any, ) to be divided among said 
sufferers and their legal representatives, in proportion to the several sums 
annexed to their names on record, (which land is located in Huron countj', in 
the state of Ohio.) An additional sum of £8,303 17 10 was added to that 
previously named for the sufferers in Danbury, making the whole amount 
£24,484 19 2. — Hinman's War of American Revolution. 

The following is a list of the sufferers, with the loss allowed by the committee, 
annexed to his name : 

.£ s. d. £ s. d. 

Mr. John McLean, . 2,492 1 1 7 David Wood, . . 433 1 
Capt. Ezra Starr, . 2,296 Joseph Wildman, . . 417 8 4 

Capt. Daniel Taylor, 984 2 Dr. John Wood, . 394 3 4 

Col. John P. Cook, . 953 9 6 Matthew Benedict, Jr., 334 11 
Major Ely Maggatt, . 116 2 2 Kev. Ebenezer White, 327 110 

Capt. James Clark, . 822 10 6 Jonah Benedict, . 309 9 8 

Major Taylor, . . 700 16 2 Matthew Benedict, . 205 4 8 

Comfort Hoyt, Jr., . 651 15 1 Jabez Rockwell, . 237 16 2 

Thaddeus Benedict, Esq., 521 19 6 Zadock Benedict, . . 169 17 
Benjamin Sperry, . . 169 16 3 

Which with a number of smaller losses, ascertained by said committee, amount 
in the whole to £16,181 1 4. 



enemy as far as Bethel, whicli they reach at eleven 
o'clock at night. Seven hundred undisciplined mili- 
tia constitute their entire force. On the morning 
of the 27th, Arnold and Silliman are directed to 
take five hundred men and intercept Tryon in front, 
wdiile WoosTER, with the two hundred left, follows 
the enemy's track to worry and harass the rear. 
He soon comes up with them, and aided by the 
broken and hilly ground, falls upon one of their 
regiments, and captures forty prisoners. He again 
attacks them a few miles from Ridgefield. The 
British rear-guard, supported by two field-pieces, 
wheel to receive him. A sharp encounter ensues. 
Wooster's troops deliver and receive several vol- 
leys, but the undisciplined handful, soon stagger and 
fall back, before the grape-shot that the enemy's 
artillery scatter. The old veteran, more familiar 
with this iron hail, infuses his own steadfastness 
into his untried band, and as he is inciting them 
to a renewed onset, with the clieering words, "Come 
on, my boys, never mind such random shots," a ball 
deliberately fired, as it is said, by a malignant tory 
who recognized his person, struck him obliquely in 
the back, breaking the bone as it passed, and bury- 
ing itself in his body. He falls fainting from his 
horse. He is carried from the field on this' sash, 

1 The sash is the property of Yale College, and with the sword of Wooster, 
and Iiis portrait, was presented in a letter from Admiral Wooster, of which the 
following is a copy: 



55 

which he wore in the battle. When the surg-eon' 
examined the wound, he did not disguise from Woos- 
TER that there was no hope for him this side of the 
grave. The tidings are received with the serene 
composure of one who had so recently shown, by 
a signal contempt for this life, how confidently he 
expected one more blessed and glorious. He is 
removed to this place with the tenderest care. His 
wife, who had been summoned, arrives, but not 
until the inflammation had extended through the 
spinal column to the brain, and he could only look 
on the face he knew the best, and loved the most, 
with the wild, unrecognizing glare of delirium. Her 
tearful and impassioned appeals can extort no sign 
of welcome. For three days he lies here in extreme 
agony, aggravated by the fruitless search of the sur- 
geon's probe, for the fatal bullet. On the morning 

"Eev. J. Day, 

" President of Yale University, 
"Rev. Sir, 
" As I shall soon leave this my native place, and there is much imcer- 
tainty as to my ever returning to it again, I beg you to receive, in behalf of the 
College, these three i-elics of my much respected grandfather, whose memory, I 
believe, is still cherished by every American patriot. His portrait, I found by 
mei-e chance, in the city of Santa Yago, the capital of Chili, ia the year 1822. 
The sword is the same which he had drawn at the time when he fell in repelling 
the inroads of the enemy of our country j and the sash is that on which he was 
carried from the field, after receiving the wound whfch caused his death. 
" With feelings of high respect and esteem, 

" I remain, reverend Sir, 

" Your obedient servant, 
"A. D. 1837. CHARLES W. WOOSTER." 

1 The surgeon's name was Turner. 



56 

of the first of May, the sudden cessation of pain 
indicates the commencement of that frightful process, 
which destroys sensation while life still lingers — the 
unmistakable precursor of death. It was noted by 
her, who, faithful to the last, unremittingly watches 
his pillow, that during this and the following day, 
(as is frequently the case, in the closing scene of an 
active life,) his mind was busied in exciting reminis- 
cence. By the feeble light of flickering reason, he 
was tracing the long and weary pilgrimage, the 
cruises, sieges, battles, marches, through which he 
had passed, only to reach the grave. The home 
of his childhood, the cabin of his ship, the old man- 
sion by the Sound, pass in a blended image before 
his fading vision. The dash of waves, the rattle 
of musketry, the roar of cannon, ring confusedly in 
his deafened ear. His hand can not respond to the 
gentle pressure of affection. His breathing grows 
shorter and shorter, while the icy chill advances 
nearer and nearer to the heart. As his wife wipes 
the death damps from his brow, his eyes, hitherto 
closed, open once more, and in their clear depths, 
for one glad moment, she discovers the dear, the 
old, the familiar expression of returned conscious- 
ness; his lips gasp in vain to utter one precious 
word of final adieu, and the last effort of his depart- 
ing soul, is to throw on her, one farewell glance of 
unutterable tenderness and love. Thus on the 2d 
of May, 177T, in the service of the state to which 
his youth, his manhood and his age had been devo- 



57 

ted, David Wooster died. Of the thirteen thou- 
sand sons which Connecticut gave to the French 
war, and of the thirty-one thousand which she gave 
to the Kevohuion, lie was among the foremost. 
Equal to any in courage, in patriotism, in generosity, 
in zeal for liberty, in that true magnanimity which 
can forget all personal slights and affronts in her 
great cause ; second to Putnam, and to Putnam alone, 
in the length, variety and hardship of his martial 
labors ; superior even to him, in the glory of his final 
exit, and the obscurity of his grave. Exhausting his 
means in the public service, he only bequeathed 
poverty to his family, and oblivion to his remains. 
Unrewarded, unrequited in life, in death he received 
a monument that was never built, and an inscription 
that was never engraved.' 

1 "Monday, May \9th, 1777. 

" Resolved, That a committee of three be appointed to consider what honors 
are due to the memory of h\te Brigadier Wooster, who died on the 2d of May, 
of the wounds he received on the 27tli of April, in fighting against the enemies 
of American liberty." 

The members chosen were ]Mr. Heyward, Mr. S. Adams, and Mr. Sage. 

" Tuesday, June I7th, 1777. 

" The committee appointed to consider what honors are due to the memory 
of General Wooster, brought forward tlieir report, which was taken into con- 
sideration, whereupon, 

" Resolved, That a monument be erected to the memory of Gen. Wooster, 
with the following inscription : ' In honor of David Wooster, brigadier-general 
in the army of the United States. In defending the liberties of America, and 
bravely repelling an inroad of the British forces to Danbury, in Connecticut, he 
received a mortal wound on the 27th day of April, 1777, and died on the 2d day 
of May following. The Congi-ess of the United States, as an acknowledgment 
of his merit and services, have caused this monument to be erected.' 



58 

We can not follow such a career, we can not 
stand by such a grave, without renewing our con- 
secration vows to freedom. By what a long century 
of conflict; by what death struggles with earth's 
master-races, the Celt, the Gaul and the Saxon ; by 
wdiat weariness of spirit, what agony of soul, what 
squandering of blood, has her fair inheritance been 
purchased ! 

*' Fix^edom, thy brow 
Glorious in beauty though it be, is scarred 
With tokens of old wars ; thy massive liiiibs 
Are strong with struggling. Power at thee 
Has launched his bolts, and with his lightnings smitten thee : 
They could not quench the light thou hast from heaven. 

Oh ! not yet 
May'st thou unbrace thy corselet, nor lay by 
Thy sword ; not yet, O Freedom, close thy lids 
In slumber, for thine enemy never sleeps, 
And thou must watch and combat till the day 
Of the new earth and heaven." 

If in the dangers that threaten her for the future, 
aught for her welfare is intrusted to us ; if upon our 

" Resolved, That the executive power of the state of Connecticut, l)e requested 
to cany the foregoing resolution into execution; and that $500 l)e allowed for 
that pui-pose." — Journals of Congress, Vol. III., pp. 156, 197. 

It lias been said that the appropriation made for the erection of Gen. Woos- 
ter's monument, " was entrusted to the charge of his son, but never used for 
the purpose." I can find no proof of this statement, and it has always been 
strenuously denied by the relatives of Thomas Wooster, and Ijy others who 
have investigated the matter. 



59 

council she ever relies, in those moments that mold 
her destiny, upon us to defend any of those solemn 
compacts that secure to her an illimitable domain 
for the immeasurable future; if upon our arm she 
is to lean in the impending crisis of her decisive 
battle, let us repair to the graves of those who have 
shielded her in the past, as to altars ever lighted 
with the sacred fire of heroism. Let us there im- 
plore wisdom, self-denial, patience, courage, strength ; 
let us there forget all pride of opinion, ambition, 
selfishness, the bubbles we crave, the vanities we 
pursue, everything but self-immolating devotion to 
her holy cause. We need not wander to poetry or 
fable, to other times, to other lands, or to sister 
states, for that past renown which nurtures this 
heroic element of character. We have it nearer 
home, in our own neighborhood, beneath our own 
feet. We tread on soil ransomed by blood; the 
young flowers our children sow, may take their root 
in the holy clay of unknown martyrs. If we but 
turn to the silent halls of death, we can find in 
almost every graveyard of Connecticut, immortal 
examples of patriotic virtue, imperishable models of 
every exalted worth; while no chronicle of wild 
romance, breathes such inspiriting strains to deeds 
of sacrifice and daring, as the story of Connecticut's 
struggle for liberty and religion. The living seed 
of future heroes and patriots is in our fathers' dust. 
We will treasure up every council which they med- 
itated in perplexity, every stirring word they uttered 



60 

in peril and despair, all that they achieved for lib- 
erty, with the halter round their necks, and the 
scaffold before them. We will sacredly guard the 
graves, that hold such precious inspiration for the 
future; we will mark them with memorials that 
shall endure, to the last syllable of recorded time. 
We will lead the first thoughts of aspiring youth, 
and the last of desponding age, to the monumental 
shafts, which tell how Hale, and Led yard, and Woos- 
TER died. Glorious martyr! over whose ashes we 
have this day performed the last solemn rites of 
gratitude, touch our hearts with a spark from that 
flame which burned in thy own; inspire us with 
thy unfaltering love for country; teach us nobly to 
suffer, bravely to die! 



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